The digital video market is among the earliest markets to develop out of the emerging multimedia business. The applications of digital video will first appear in video-on-demand (VOD) services, which enable viewers to call up particular movies, educational videos, or other video programs whenever they want to watch them. Most present day movie request systems are analog rather than digital having fixed movie start times.
Digital video-on-demand programs may be provided from a centralized location for a large number of users or can be provided "downstream" at Local Exchange companies or Cable Companies. Video-on-demand services are expected to be among the most popular interactive multimedia offerings on the electronic information superhighway.
A network providing movie-on-demand services, upon receipt from a VOD customer of a signal requesting to view a movie, must verify the request and set up necessary connections to a video storage server. Ideally, a video-on-demand (VOD) system will provide functionality similar to that of a video cassette recorder (VCR) or video disk player. The video subscriber or viewer should have control over viewing of video/audio recorded information, including control of start, stop, pause, fast forward, reverse and rewind operations. The video-on-demand service provides the viewer with a large choice of content and allows the viewer to select "hot" new movies, documentaries, old movies, etc. It is a necessary function for a VOD system to store audio/video content and to also permit multiple viewers to access a video program. The system should allow multiple viewers to watch the same video starting at the same time or at different start times. Further, the VOD service must provide a means to select videos, check access rights, bill customers and manage network resources involved in downloading of video content.
The primary component of a VOD system is a video server, a combination of computer hardware and software for delivering stored video information to one or more viewers. A video server should preferably provide storage for hundreds of feature movies, educational video, and other video information for delivery to a viewer upon request.
Present video server implementations utilize technologies and architectures that have limited expandability in terms of number of users supported, performance, and cost of the storage capacity (e.g. high bandwidth). Additionally, most present day video server implementations do not provide multiple users with the ability to start, stop, pause, fast forward or reverse video play. Movies on such a system have dedicated play times not controlled by the viewer.
The present invention brings together, in a concise manner, the technologies of the telephone industry and of the computer industry to allow peak utilization of each of these technologies and avoid deficiencies inherent to each. The invention described herein brings together the necessary components of a VOD system such that a range of services can be implemented incrementally relative to cost and function. The invention described below, through the organization provided by server architecture, uniquely meets the requirements of a video server and the delivery transport to the end user.